Open Mic Night

Last day of classes! Woo hoo. Feels good...but kind of weird--a bit like my empty week when I first came here, except now I know my way around and have tests to study for. And trips to plan.

My day started out very early, since I went to the college before my 9 a.m. to print out my two papers and some tickets that I purchased yesterday. Between classes, I turned in the essays, so now I'm officially done with four of my six classes. Kind of crazy.

During Irish class, Daithi (the instructor) overheard Courtney and I talking about our trip to Scotland, and he taught us how to say hello, how are you, and thank you in Scots Gaelic. Maybe we'll actually use that when we get there--who knows?

Afterward, I walked to the tourist office and met with a very unhelpful woman who just told me everything I'd already found out online. Ugh. After I sat around all day, watched Mulan, and went to my API meeting, I talked to the API director about my second Scotland trip, and she was actually helpful and very encouraging. So far everything I've planned is correct, and she gave me a bunch of advice about traveling alone, plus reminded me that her phone is on 24 hours a day, no matter what.

Finally, after three weeks of staying-at-home-ness, I went out with a group of API kids to an Open Mic night in the cellar of the pub called The Cellar. Miriam sang and played guitar, along with other performers, and an Irish friend of ours named Shane played kazoo in his first band, then sang in a second one. It was interesting, to say the least. One man tried telling Hitler jokes, another usually plays on the streets for tips, and this one guy even did an acoustic rendition of Lady Gaga. Oh Ireland...

I'm quite tired and slightly cranky, as you might have noticed, so I'll go to sleep now and hopefully write a better post tomorrow. Night.

The Worst Part of Traveling

Oh. My. Goodness.

I have spent the past three hours trying to plan how I'm going to get to Wales and Scotland in the next few months. I've already booked the big parts, like plane/ferry tickets and tours, but it's the getting-a-bus-to-go-to-the-city-itself part that's killing me.

For instance: My lovely 5-day tour of Scotland. Sounds great. Of course, since the plane tickets direct from Shannon to Edinburgh are sold out, I ended up booking from Dublin to Glasgow--and even then, I had to book a couple days in advance and then after the trip ends too. I'll have to find a hostel in Glasgow, then a bus to Edinburgh, then another hostel, then some more at the other end of the trip. It's such a nightmare!

The trip to Fishguard is going a little more smoothly. Martha and I settled on a date today, so I booked the ferry for April 25, which gives me one day after my finals finish to catch a bus to Wexford, where I'll find a hostel for the night, then hopefully make the only bus of the day to Rosslare Harbour so I can make the ferry. Please cross your fingers for me!!

Tomorrow I'm planning on going to the tourist office in Galway to see if they can help me make sure I've planned everything correctly so far and to book some more bus tickets that I need to get to Wexford/Dublin at various points. I've basically killed my budget at this point, and all on travel. It's a really good thing I'm not going to Europe now.

Besides that, today was pretty uneventful. I had three classes: the first was an exam, which was a complete joke--it took 5 minutes, and since the professor left, everyone cheated (meanwhile, there were 120 seats for 160 students...); then my Women's Studies professor gave us Easter candy and free t-shirts; and finally, my King Arthur professor rambled about the Holy Grail for a while. I was also supposed to go to an Archaeology Society lecture tonight, but it is so decidely nasty and windy and rainy and gross outside that I didn't go. It's a half hour walk to campus, then an hour to listen to some guy, then another half hour back in the dark and rain. No thanks.

Hmm...what else. Well, Jackie (the one I live with) gave me her copy of a guide to Scotland since I'll be going there twice. She and some other API kids went last month, but she said she won't need the map anymore. I might try to find a Wales/England map tomorrow, but maybe I'll just print some off while I'm printing my million tickets from online bookings.

Oh--I found out why Seamus, the guy from my King Arthur class, has such an odd accent. His parents are from Donegal (in the north of Ireland; people from there have a very distinctive accent) but he was raised in Australia and only recently came back to study at Galway when his parents moved back to Ireland. I knew he sounded Australian, but now I know why. It's funny--I try to guess who is Irish when I see people, since it's surprising just how many Americans there are here. You can sometimes tell by their faces and their clothes...and also by the way they write the date, use several colors of pen in their notes, etc. I feel like I'm stereotyping, but somehow they can tell when we're American too. I look very American, always. I went to use my umbrella yesterday, which I grabbed from the mud room at home and had never taken off the cover of before. Much to my horror, it's covered in blinding stars and stripes--as if I didn't look like a Yank already. I voted for having wet hair and depending on my raincoat rather than using it. Sorry Mom.

Tomorrow is my last day of classes! It's exciting, but I'm nervous about all the traveling I plan to do. I don't know the details of when and where we leave next week, we don't have any details for the U.K. trip the week after, I am scared of all the buses and hostels I need to find while I'm in Scotland, and jeez--I haven't even starting looking at visiting places in Ireland yet. If I make it home alive and sane, it will be a miracle.

I've got to go revise my last two papers so I can turn them in tomorrow, so for now it's good night.

Rain, Rain, Go Away

That should say it all. It's been a steady downpour the entire day. After my initial shower in my bathroom, I had several more as I walked to class and then to buy groceries. My bread didn't appreciate having a bath--neither did my textbooks. Oh well.

After I came back from my class and meeting with my professor, I put on PJs since I was completely soaked and all my other pants were in the wash. Obviously, I haven't left the house since and it's been a lovely lazy day. I have a final tomorrow, so I studied a bit for that, although I fell asleep at one point...I think I'll do okay, plus I have all morning to study.

Since I decided not to go to Europe with everyone else, I've been brainstorming places to visit in Ireland instead. I figure it'll be easier just to travel around here instead, plus it seems silly to live here for five months and only see two or three major cities when I have all this time to explore. Alice won't 'cause she saw it all a couple of years ago, and Courtney does whatever she does, so I'll be heading off on my lonesome. Should be fun, though!

Umm...what else? Well, the plan for this week is to revise my essays and then turn them in so I don't have them hanging over my head while I travel the next few weeks. After that, I want to finish my studyguides for the two finals in April so I can print them and study while I'm in the U.K. I'll have a week to study when I get back too, so I'm also not too worried about that. It's crazy that classes end on Wednesday, and that I'm basically done with all of my work. Even more shocking--two months from today at this time, I will be in the U.S. Wow. It has gone so fast, although I kind of don't mind. I really like it here, but I miss home and everyone there. I feel like my friends here are growing apart from me, so it's a bit lonely, but I talk to someone from home most days and that helps.

Maybe it's obvious, but I'm kind of mopey today. I don't feel great, it's rainy, and I have an exam tomorrow--all of those usually add up to blah. At school today everyone was in a bad mood, so Alice and I got in a tiff and Barrett and Courtney had a bit of a yelling match too. Ugh. Please come back, sun!

I guess that's about it for now. Since I'm planning on traveling around Ireland in May, please email me or let me know somehow if you have any ideas for good places to see! I'm game for most anything, so I'd love to hear suggestions. Cheers! Good night.

Weekend in Dublin

Heads up right now--this is a long post. Just didn't want you to get scared or anything if your computer suddenly crashes or your browser takes forever to load. Part of that might be the block of videos at the end...which I think have repeats, since halfway through loading them I forgot which ones I'd already put up. My bad.

Anyway! This weekend was the last API sponsored trip of the semester. We went to Dublin for one night, two days--and it was loads of fun! Let me give a brief preview before I delve into the pictures.

The best part?

• The Wax Museum. Oh yeah. It's as awesome as it sounds. Apparently we didn't even go to the main branch, but some side one that had all these random people in it, like Harry Potter and Oscar Wilde...together.
• The food. Okay, I know, that's two things, but my Elephantburger was mad good today. Don't judge.
• Learning how to write my name in Viking runes.
  

The worst part?

• The ONE museum that I wanted to visit, the only thing I really was banking on seeing, was closed because they can't afford to pay employees overtime so they can be open Sundays. Ughh. It was the archaeology part of the National Museum, and it's got all these amazing items that we've been learning about in classes all semester, like the Tara Brooch, the Ardagh Chalice...

Other than that one sadness, the trip was a lot of fun. We left Galway in the morning yesterday and got to Dublin by 1 p.m., where we checked into our hotel and then headed off to Trinity College to see the Book of Kells. That is a very early monastic piece that is in (relatively) excellent condition. The display also included information about other, similar books, like a poem one monk wrote about his cat...and another poem by a different monk about how his quill leaks ink all over the page in beautiful designs...sounds like these guys were kind of bored back then. Anyway, there was also a video that showed how they made the books, which was interesting. Afterward, we headed upstairs to see the Long Room, which is this amazing amazing amazing old room in the library with floor-to-ceiling books--on two floors--with vaulted ceiling and ladders and wonderful smells and yum. I contemplated living there forever, but figured they would find me eventually.

This is part of Trinity College. We couldn't take pictures inside of the exhibit.
After that, we had free time for the rest of Saturday. Jackie visited Dublin last week with her sister, so she had a really good grasp of how to get places and of things to do, so we next went to the Wax Museum Plus--AKA four floors of creepy wax sculptures. I kept thinking they were real people, and then sometimes I thought real people were wax and I freaked out when they started moving. Each room was themed and had a tour you could listen to by pressing a button in the wall. Rooms included the Writer's Room, the Irish Mythology Room (my favorite!), the Vikings, Fantasy, and Science. Here's some of my favorites:

Oscar Wilde. Needs a hairbrush. Elsewhere in the city there's a statue of him, which everyone calls "The Fag on the Crag." Nice.
James Joyce. Friday was Daffodil Day for cancer, so apparently someone wanted him to pitch in.
Down in the Vikings room, this monk is being cut open by an invader. Certainly a much different take on things than the tour we took Sunday, which made the Vikings sound all happy and nice.
The pirate queen Grace O'Malley.
The Irish hero Setanta, son of the sometimes-god Lug, fighting the guard hound. Better give the background here: the basics of the myth is that Setanta wanted to get into this guy's manor to eat at the feast, but they had already closed the doors and set the hound out to guard them. To get in, Setanta fought the dog using only his hurling stick and ball--and won. Because the owner then had no dog, Setanta became his new guard dog until he could find the guy a new one. His name then became Cu Chulainn, which means guard of the guy's house (clearly I don't remember the owner's name). He's really famous, and my Celtic Mythology teacher is convinced he's gay, but that's neither here nor there, since he's cool in my book.

Another god, gaining powers by eating a fish.
And yet another mythological woman. And Miriam...
In the room featuring the Irish Rebellion, Alice practices her gunmanship. Is that a word?
This guy was in the hallway--by the way, the basement of this building must have been a jail at some point, since all the doors were intensely gated--yelled at us to get a move on or he'd shoot.
Jackie's little friend here also talked when he sensed people going by. He was in the entrance to the Horror section.
Hmm...out of order for sure. Some of the more recent politicians and their new friends.
Back to Horror. Dracula's not having a good day.
Neither is Frankenstein's monster.
Jack in the Beanstalk led our way up the stairs.
The giant at the top shouted down to him. And us--it went something like "If you drank too much tea, come here to go pee!!" (The bathrooms were next to him...)
!!!!!!!!!!! Harry Potter!!!!!!!!!!!! He's so little!
There was also a random science wing in the museum, even though there were no wax sculptures there.




The last room (I skipped some in this online tour) was a medley of film and music stars. Like Bond, James Bond.
After the museum, we found St. Stephen's Green, which is this beautiful little park across the street with a mini Arc d'Trimuph (horrible spelling) from Paris. On our way there, we crossed paths with a guy in full drag, who said hi.
Even swans like Fritos.

All the flowers smelled so good. They were all over.
Creepers in the bushes...otherwise known as Jackie and Courtney.
Family photo.
The statue of Molly Malone (you know, the girl from the poem who sells cockles and mussels). She's dressed for her night job, though...
The main street is O'Connell street, and at the end is the statue of the man himself. He's protected by four angels, but is actually riddled with bullet holes from Irish and English fights here.
The logo of the city. The street lights make the weirdest bird sounds too to tell you when to cross.
The Famine Statues were right by our hotel, as was the reconstruction of a famine ship.
The view from my hotel window. We went back to the hotel for a couple hours so people could relax, then we went out to a couple pubs and then a cafe. The atmosphere was so different from Galway, which is a college party town. Here, everyone was out having fun on the streets.
All to myself! Even got a couch.

After we got back, we sat in Miriam and Jackie's room for an hour, just talking and wishing that it wasn't Daylight Savings Time. We lost an hour this morning--some people missed the tour because of it!

Here's the famine ship in the daylight.
Okay, so on our bus tour I took a million picture of random buildings. Basically, I just picked some clear ones to put up here. This is a bank. Yay.
Where the Teichoch (?) lives/works. He's basically the Prime Minister, who does most of the work for the President.
In the north side of the city, which is traditionally the more upper class half, there are several blocks of Georgian buildings, which would have all originally had double doors like this one. They all were black too, but people starting painting them all different colors to show which ones were theirs.
In front, you can still see the manhole covers where the coal men used to drop coal down the chutes to the basement.
Down the street is...one of two maternity wards in the city! Our guide got really exited about it.
The parks, which are now public, that surround the Georgian parks are covered with the paintings of local artists on Sundays as they try to sell them. Here they're still setting up, but I get you can't even see the fence once they get going.
Some random statue outside of a building. The city seems to have lots of these weird statues...
The Olympia Theatre has never been renovated--it's still the original decor and boxes inside.
A cathedral. This is where we went to Dvblinia later.
More weird statues.
Guinness had thousands of workers at one point, so the company built lots of housing for the employees. Some of them only got running water and showers 20 years ago. Can you imagine?
Um...yeah. Forgot what this was. Although nearby was the church where Bram Stoker got married--sick!
Sorry about the horrible shot, but there is a section of the original city wall to the left.
This is another part of the original Guinness factory area.
Random ugly modern building.
We took a detour into Phoenix Park, which is twice the size of Central Park. There's a zoo here, which is renowned for its breeding program--and because the MGM lion was raised here!
The President lives in the park...
...and so does the American Ambassador.
We stopped at the site where in 1979 the Pope preached to 1.25 million people. Finn, our director, met him the next day in Galway when she literally ran into his knees (she was 4). He picked her up, blessed her, and gave her rosary beads. Not many people can say they've met the Pope, and certainly not like that!

The view is gorgeous. The mountains in the distance are the Wicklow Mountains, and in the foreground you can see people getting ready for the bike race.
The front of the President's house. Our White House copied the design, apparently.
A statue in the park.
Part of the Guinness factory across the river.
One of the many bridges across the river Liffey. Dublin is like Paris: split in two by a river.
We stopped at Dvblinia, a museum thing that recreates what life would have been like when the Vikings were here.
Some stuff from the exhibit:




A replica of the city, both the walled part and outskirts.

I must be a horrible person, but I immediately thought of Monty Python.


If you hit this guy on the nose with the ball, he told you his story. Pity I have no aim.
Who knew chain mail and helmet would be so heavy??
Jackie tried too...
They recreated an archaeological site to show how they found stuff out about the Vikings.

This is the reconstructed face of the skeleton below.


The last hall to go downstairs was filled with stained glass windows, since it led to the cathedral.


O'Connell Street has a "knitting needle" in the middle. "Dubs" give nicknames to everything, according to Pat, our guide.
I wish we'd gone here!
The amateur sports court from the back. It seats 95,000!
A typical street.
The last thing we did today was go to the National Gallery, where we saw a bunch of paintings. We also got to hear a live orchestra rehearsing downstairs, since they had a concert at 3! I wish we could have gone, but I got a security guard to talk about it with me. We also went shopping down O'Connell Street, although I didn't get anything since we'd gone to Grafton Street (the main shopping district) on Saturday.

And that was the weekend! We left for Galway after that, and then I just webcammed for awhile and wrote this and didn't study for my exam--cheers! Tomorrow will be lots of work, so I'm going to get lots of sleep tonight and then finish off classes this week. So for now, good night!

Oh, and I apologize that the videos are so messy and unorganized!